L6 


vr 


Alumni   Address 

BY 

Raymond  Walters,  '07 

AT 

H!     COMMENCEMENT  EXERCISES 

OF 

LEHIGH  UNIVERSITY 
June  15,  1920 


Supplement  to  the  Lehigh  Alumni  Bulletin 
of  June,  1920 


.     :  •     ■    •        '.'.;.■'•          -.  ■■■  •  ■  .  ■..  -        ; 


ACTION  AND  REFLECTION 


Alumni  Address  to  the 

Class  of  1920,  Lehigh  University 

by  Raymond  Walters,  '07 

June  15,  1920 


At  the  outset  of  this  address  to  you, 
gentlemen  of  the  graduating  class  of  Le- 
high University,  I  want  to  disavow  any 
aim  of  presenting  thought  that  is  essen- 
tially new.  My  only  hope  is  to  serve,  as 
did  the  soldiers  of  David,  in  drawing  water 
out  of  the  well  that  is  in  Bethlehem  and 
also  from  distant  wells.  My  only  assur- 
ance is  that  I  myself  have  tasted  of  these 
wells  and,  finding  the  waters  exceedingly 
clean  and  sweet,  now  hold  up  a  cup  for 
your  refreshment  and  stimulus  before  you 
start  out  on  a  hard  road. 

In  this  our  study  of  the  past  for  guid- 
ance in  the  future  let  us  begin  with  a  word 
about  the  debate  between  two  conceptions 
of  man.  Classic  philosophers  from  Aris- 
totle down  have  proclaimed  that  action  is 
secondary,  that  man's  greatest  glory  is  to 
be  a  rational  thinker,  "to  apprehend 
things  noble  and  divine,"  to  know  the 
absolute.  Walter  Pater  summed  up  this 
conception  thus:  "The  end  of  life  is  not 
action  but  contemplation — being  as  dis- 
tinct from  doing."  Modern  science  views 
man  as  a  product  of  evolution,  whose 
primary  concern  in  life  is  action.  No  one 
has  better  phrased  this  view  than 
America's  greatest  philosopher,  who  by  no 
means  accepted  it  as  the  final  word.  Said 
William  James,  of  Harvard:  "Deep  in  our 
own  nature  the  biological  foundations  of 
our     consciousness     persist,     undisguised 


and  undiminished.  Our  sensations  are 
here  to  attract  us  or  to  deter  us,  our  mem- 
ories to  warn  or  encourage  us,  our  feelings 
to  impel,  and  our  thoughts  to  restrain  our 
behavior,  so  that  on  the  whole  we  may 
prosper  and  our  days  be  long  in  the  land. 
*  *  *  The  brain,  as  far  as  we  understand 
it,  is  given  us  for  practical  behavior." 

Now,  although  generalizations  are  dan- 
gerous, I  shall  risk  a  generalization  and 
proceed  upon  it  without  preliminary  com- 
ment as  to  the  wisdom  of  the  conception. 
My  two-fold  generalization  is  this:  First, 
that  life  in  the  United  States  during  the 
past  fifty  years  has  exemplified  the  con- 
ception that  man's  primary  concern  is 
action;  and,  second,  that  Lehigh  Univer- 
sity during  these  fifty  years  has  been  a 
typically  American  educational  institution 
in  preparing  for  action. 

This  emphasis  upon  action  was  a  natural 
consequence  of  the  geographic  and  eco- 
nomic situation  of  America.  From  the 
hazardous  discovery  of  the  continent, 
through  the  arduous  settlement  of  the 
colonies,  through  the  trying  revolutionary 
period,  through  the  pioneer  winning  of  the 
west,  through  the  mining  craze  and  the 
railroad  expansion  of  the  forties  and 
fifties,  America  called  from  the  Old  World 
not  the  philosophic  type  of  man  but  the 
adventurous,  dynamic  man  whose  motto 
was  Westward  Ho!  The  Civil  War  further 
bred  action  into  the  national  character. 
And  when,  at  the  close  of  "the  iron  days" 
of  '61  to  '65,  a  new  group  of  educational 
institutions  was  born  in  the  United  States, 
it  was  almost  inevitable  that  their  courses 
should  diverge  from  the  classical  system 
as  represented  at  Harvard  and  Yale,  and 
should    respond    to    the    demand    for    the 

2 


training   of   men   to   resume   the   material 
conquest  of  the  continent. 

The  new  group  included  the  Massa- 
chusetts Institute  of  Technology,  Lehigh 
University,  and  Cornell  University,  begin- 
ning in  1865,  1866  and  1868  respectively. 
The  "Memorial"  laying  the  foundation  of 
the  Massachusetts  Institute  planned  a 
polytechnic  college  "to  equip  its  students 
with  every  scientific  and  technical  principle 
applicable  to  the  industrial  pursuits  of  the 
age."  In  the  first  Lehigh  "Register"  the 
purpose  was  set  forth  to  provide,  in  ad- 
dition to  liberal  courses,  training  for  the 
"young  men  of  the  Valley,  of  the  State 
and  of  the  Country,  for  those  industrial 
pursuits  which  tend  to  develop  the  re- 
sources of  the  country."  Said  Ezra  Cor- 
nell: "I  would  found  an  institution  where 
any  person  can  find  instruction  in  any 
study."  The  nation  needed  up-building. 
A  generation  of  young  builders  responded. 
Lehigh,  along  with  the  institutions  cited 
and  others,  furnished  a  notable  share  of 
these  builders. 

Thus  Lehigh  has  been  molded  and  in 
turn  has  helped  to  mold  national  life  of 
the  past  half-century.  Lehigh  has  been 
American  to  the  core,  with  the  virtues 
and  the  shortcomings  of  America. 

Foreign  critics  used  to  take  care  that 
the  United  States  should  not  be  unaware 
of  its  shortcomings.  Doubtless  there  were 
crudities,  callowness,  lack  of  interest  in 
intellectual  matters  in  portions  of  our 
population  which  merited  the  criticism 
received.  Doubtless  there  was  at  Lehigh 
in  certain  periods  some  disregard  for  the 
urbanity  and  refinement  of  older  seats  of 
learning,  some  neglect  of  the  philosoph- 
ical   aspect    of   life.      These   shortcomings 

3 


were  the  shortcomings  of  a  young  nation, 
of  a  young  institution. 

The  virtues  of  the  nation  have  been 
Homeric  directness  and  force,  of  which 
Lincoln  stands  as  the  finest  exponent; 
with  Theodore  Roosevelt,  I  risk  saying,  as 
the  typical  exponent  of  our  own  day. 

The  virtues  of  Lehigh  have  been  similar, 
with  this  characteristic,  that  she  has  in- 
sisted upon  scholastic  first-rateness  and 
clean  execution,  and  in  so  doing  she  has 
trained  her  sons  to  meet  difficulties  and 
to  master  them.  The  doctrine  and  the 
practice  from  the  first  have  been:  Here, 
student,  is  your  problem.  If  you  shirk, 
you  do  not  pass.  If  you  are  unqualified 
for  any  reason,  you  do  not  pass.  Lehigh 
guides  and  helps.  But  you  solve  the  prob- 
lem. Thus,  bred  by  no  over-indulgent 
mother,  Spartan  sons  have  been  developed. 
During  the  war  I  knew  a  very  able  army 
officer,  a  graduate  of  West  Point,  who 
declared:  "I  have  noted  that  when  a  Le- 
high man  has  a  job  to  do  he  doesn't  come 
back  With  an  alibi;  he  comes  back  with  the 
bacon."  It  would  be  easy  to  starch  and 
iron  the  phrasing  into  prettier  shape,  but 
the  tribute  is  there  and  it  rings  true. 

Two  practical  tenets  issue  from  these 
traditions  of  Lehigh.  The  first  is  decisive 
thorough  action  as  a  fundamental  for  the 
conduct  of  life.  The  besetting  sin  of  most 
of  us  is  dawdling.  We  ought  to  attack  our 
tasks  promptly.  We  ought  to  see  them 
through  to  a  finish.  Trite  words,  these; 
but  unless  we  make  them  a  living  formula 
there  can  be  no  effective  strength  in  us. 
Your  courses  at  Lehigh  have  been  so 
ordered  as  to  give  you  a  start  in  this 
fundamental.  According  to  the  law  of  the 
modification  of  the  nerve  cells  of  the  brain, 
you  are  assured  a  return  with  interest 
4 


upon  the  tendencies  to  act  with  prompt- 
ness, concentration  and  diligence,  which 
you  have  learned  here.  But  you  must  pay 
the  daily  price  of  exercising  these  tenden- 
cies in  concrete  tasks.  You  should  re- 
gard every  piece  of  work  that  comes  to 
your  hand  as  an  opportunity  to  gain 
power.  It  is  a  scientific  fact  that  all  work 
well  done  today  modifies  the  nerve  cells 
and  helps  to  insure  success  tomorrow. 
Achievement  begets  achievement. 

Some  qualifications  are  necessary,  of 
course.  You  should  not  confuse  this  doc- 
trine of  achievement  with  worship  of  suc- 
cess in  the  sense  of  "getting  there,"  at  any 
cost;  but  neither  should  you  fall  into  the 
reverse-Philistinism  which  scorns  wealth 
and  position  as  such.  You  must  not 
ordinarily  count  upon  exceptional  achieve- 
ment in  those  realms  of  effort  about  which 
poor  Wagner  in  "Faust"  sighed:  "Ach, 
Gott,  die  Kunst  ist  lang  (Art  is  long);" 
but  you  ought  to  remember  that  "the  age 
when  men  are  eager  about  great  work  is 
the  age  when  great  work  gets  itself  done." 

We  should  cultivate  the  enjoyment  of 
success  in  doing.  When  night  comes  we 
ought  to  find  our  reward,  not  in  the  praise 
of  others,  although  that  is  pleasant,  but  in 
the  approval  of  our  critical  consciences  as 
we  say  "Today  I  achieved,"  or,  in  Brown- 
ing's words,  "Today  I  strove,  made  head, 
gained  ground  upon  the  whole." 

The  second  tenet  based  on  Lehigh  tradi- 
tions is  closely  connected  with  the  first. 
The  French  have  an  apt  phrase  for  the 
thinker  who  fails  in  sustained  attention; 
they  designate  him  as  one  incapable  of 
work,  de  longue  haleine, — of  long  breath. 
During  the  war  it  was  demonstrated  how 
much  longer  is  the  breath  which  the  aver- 

5 


fl<A,<AriM^    -^AjL/wto      M/aXfx-vj     vii   ^(1U-    ^  |k-J    m 

age  man  can  take — when  he  has  to.  Under 
the  spur  of  necessity  and  the  tonic  of  a 
great  cause  countless  men  performed  a 
quantity  and  quality  of  work  of  which 
they  never  dreamed  they  were  capable. 
This  1920  class  has  members  whose  mili- 
tary exploits  illustrate  the  theory  of  hu- 
man energy  Professor  James  put  forth  be- 
fore the  American  Philosophical  Associa- 
tion some  fourten  years  ago:  "As  a  rule 
men  habitually  use  only  a  small  part  of 
the  powers  which  they  actually  possess. 
*  *  *  A  nation  filled  with  such  men  is 
inferior  to  a  nation  run  at  higher  pres- 
sure." 

The  deep-buried  resources  of  human 
nature  are  ignored  in  attempts  of  elements 
in  our  society  today  to  lower  the  level  of 
production.  This  is  no  advocacy  of  long 
working  hours.  I  agree  with  the  English 
labor  leader,  Frank  Hodge,  that  workers 
should  have  "leisure  for  family  life,  edu- 
cation, recreation,  a  hobby."  But  I  do 
urge  you  men  to  top-notch  quantitative 
and  qualitative  effort  during  the  hours 
of  a  normal  day.  "An  honest  day's  work 
for  an  honest  day's  pay,"  the  slogan  of 
Mr.  Schwab,  is  sound  sense  in  science  as 
it  is  in  economics.  Hard  work  physically 
will  not  endanger  health,  if  decent 
hygenic  cautions  are  observed. 

Regarding  the  myth  that  hard  work 
mentally  causes  brain  disorder,  let  me  cite 
the  judgment  of  Dr.  Boris  Sidis:  "I  have 
not  met  a  single  case  of  nervous  or  mental 
trouble  caused  by  too  much  thinking  or 
over  study.  This  is  now  the  opinion  of  the 
best  psychopathologists.  What  produces 
nervousness  is  worry,  emotional  excite- 
ment and  lack  of  interest  in  the  work." 

St.  Paul's  advice  to  the  Thessalonians 
is  pertinent  here:  "Study  to  be  quiet  and 
6 


v  6*v-.    CAn\^^--     ^^v  ^-^1— 


to  do  your  own  business  and  to  work  with 
your  own  hands." 

Lehigh  students,  thanks  to  the  exacting, 
persistent  requirements  of  the  faculty  of 
this  University,  past  and  present,  have  in 
general  developed  a  high  rate  of  energiz- 
ing. The  demand  has  been  hard  work  and 
lots  of  it  and  under  this  demand  Lehigh 
men  have  grown  in  power. 

We  of  Lehigh  have  an  example  of  all 
this  in  the  great  leader  who  is  now  retir- 
ing from  the  presidency  of  the  University. 
A  driving  energy  has  been  the  life-long 
characteristic  of  Henry  Sturgis  Drinker. 
Tributes  to  this  energy  have  come  from 
eminent  co-workers  in  the  national  move- 
ments in  which  he  engaged  to  the  joint 
profit  of  the  country  and  of  our  University. 
Tributes  have  come  from  students,  faculty, 
alumni,  trustees,  friends  of  Lehigh — all 
who  know  what  this  energy  has  wrought 
upon  the  side  of  South  Mountain  in  the 
external  things — buildings  and  equipment, 
and  likewise  in  the  internal  things — tone 
and  morale.  Our  hearts  go  out  in  grati- 
tude and  love  on  this  last  day  of  his  Presi- 
dency to  Dr.  Drinker,  seventy  years  young, 
epitome  of  Lehigh. 

Just  as  he  has  represented  the  Lehigh 
capacity  for  action  so  Dr.  Drinker,  in  his 
devotion  to  cultural  forces,  represents  Le- 
high's best  in  the  humanities.  There  could 
be  no  better  exemplar  to  cite  to  you  today. 

I  shall  have  erred  if  my  statement  of 
the  importance  of  action  has  been  so  em- 
phatic as  to  over-top  the  importance  of 
reflection.  The  biological  conception  of 
the  origin  of  man  and  the  psychological 
study  of  the  mind  of  man  do  not  by  any 
means  invalidate  the  doctrine  of  the  worth 
of  the  human  soul.     Spiritual  things  stand 

7 


out  with  no  less  significance  in  the  light 
of  science  than  according  to  anthropocen- 
tric  ideas. 

Action  is  good.  But  action  without  re- 
flection may  be  but  the  hopping  of  a 
canary  bird  from  one  rung  of  its  cage  to 
another.  We  have  action  of  that  sort  in 
the  leaders  of  Mexico  whom  Senor  Ibanez 
has  been  reporting.  We  have  it  in  the 
type  of  engineer  capable  of  performing  an 
assigned  job  but  incapable  of  initiating 
and  executing  in  the  larger  sense. 

You  are  doubtless  acquainted  with  the 
trick  of  the  movie  directors  by  which  pic- 
tures are  taken,  for  example,  of  houses  a 
few  inches  high  swept  by  a  flood  through 
a  miniature  valley  with  mountains  a  few 
feet  high  in  the  background.  Lacking 
standards  of  measurement  the  spectators 
believe  they  see  a  real  cataclysm.  Simi- 
larly, those  lacking  standards  of  measure- 
ment in  economics,  in  philosophy,  in  liter- 
ature, are  often  led  to  accept  illusory 
theories  and  works  as  sound  and  import- 
ant. 

The  one  best  way  to  obtain  standards  of 
measurement — to  fortify  oneself  against 
intellectual  whooping  cough  and  mumps — 
is,  of  course,  to  familiarize  oneself  in  youth 
with  the  masterpieces  in  given  fields  and 
to  reflect  upon  them.  Thus  judgment  is 
trained.  I  would  like  to  hold  before  the 
Lehigh  graduate  the  ideal  set  by  Professor 
Quiller-Couch  for  the  Cambridge  gradu- 
ate: "A  man  of  unmistakable  intellectual 
breeding  whose  trained  judgment  we  can 
trust  to  choose  the  better  and  reject  the 
worse." 

Lehigh  has  never  ignored  the  humani- 
ties. A  department  called  the  School  of 
General  Literature  was  an  integral  part  of 
the  University  at  its  founding.  Continu- 
8 


ing  as  the  College  of  Arts  and  Science  it 
is  destined  to  grow  with  the  College  of 
Engineering  and  the  College  of  Business 
Administration  in  the  full  flowering  of  Le- 
high as  a  University.  I  look  forward  to 
seeing  more  electives  in  the  humanities 
offered  to  engineering  students  and  to  see- 
ing advantage  taken  of  them. 

Is  it  too  much  to  ask  of  American  engi- 
neers and  men  of  business  that  they  strive 
for  the  things  of  the  intellect,  of  the  soul. 
The  theory  of  higher  levels  of  energizing 
cited  in  regard  to  physical  capacities  ap- 
plies also  to  mental  capacities.  All  of  us 
are  capable  of  a  wider  range  and  loftier 
plateaus  intellectually.  It  is  a  matter  of 
desire  and  the  use  of  leisure.  If  you  men 
of  the  graduating  class  spend  your  hours 
after  work  in  the  conventional  tea-dance, 
country-club  sort  of  thing,  you  will  be  just 
one  more  group  of  American  youth  who 
fail  in  intellectual  leadership. 

In  carrying  to  you  water  from  our  Beth- 
lehem well  and  other  wells,  regarding  action, 
I  gave  two  tenets  to  remember.  Let  me, 
in  regard  to  water  from  the  wells  of  re- 
flection, be  equally  specific. 

Here  are  a  few  practical  admonitions 
from  Dr.  Fullerton,  Professor  of  Philoso- 
phy at  Columbia,  to  young  men  willing  to 
try  the  contemplative  life: 

1.  Be  prepared  to  enter  upon  a  new 
way  of  looking  at  things. 

2.  Do  not  have  too  much  respect  for 
philosophic  authority.  Beware  of  schools 
of  opinion  with  their  narrowing  tenden- 
cies. 

3.  Do  not  hastily  accept  a  doctrine. 
Have  patience  and  a  willingness  to  accept 
the  established  order  of  things  until  one 
is  very  sure  that  one  has  attained  to  some 
truth — some  real  truth. 

9 


May  I  add  to  this  the  maxim  of  an  in- 
formal philosopher  of  rare  wisdom, 
Thomas  Davidson,  the  man  who  urged  us 
to  "be  on  earth  what  good  people  hope 
to  be  in  heaven."  This  was  his  final  word 
to  his  class:  "Never  be  satisfied  until  you 
have  understood  the  meaning  of  the  world, 
and  the  purpose  of  your  own  life,  and  have 
reduced  your  world  to  a  rational  cosmos." 

We  face  troubled  days.  With  the  great- 
est of  all  military  wars  just  over  we  hear 
on  every  hand  of  economic  wars  and 
rumors  of  wars.  Whether  we  are,  as  Mr. 
Brooks  Adams  has  speculated,  in  his  bril- 
liant "Theory  of  Social  Evolution,"  upon 
the  threshold  of  a  new  social  era  no  liv- 
ing man  can  tell.  I  hazard  the  prediction 
that  no  changes  in  social  organization  will 
permanently  come  which  will  change  in- 
tegrity, tolerance,  initiative,  courage  and 
work  of  the  individual  citizen  as  the  funda- 
mentals of  civilization. 

Those  who  have  these  qualities  in  pre- 
eminent degree  will  always  be  the  leaders 
of  mankind. 

The  union  of  action  and  reflection  to 
which  I  have  been  urging  you  gentlemen 
of  the  graduating  class  will  assuredly  help 
you  toward  leadership.  It  has  so  helped 
many  Lehigh  men  before  you.  May  you 
join  the  ranks  of  those  who  deserve  well 
of  their  country  because  by  thought  and 
by  action  they  truly  serve  her. 


10 


